tears from your eyes for ever. Oh that comfortable word! "I have chosen thee in the furnaces of afflic tion ;"so that our very sorrows are evidences of our calling, and he chastens us because we are his children. My dear cousin, I commit you to the word of his grace, and to the comforts of his Holy Spirit. Your life is needful for your family; may God in mercy to them prolong it, and may he preserve you from the dangerous effects which a stroke like this might have upon a frame so tender as yours. I grieve with you-I pray for you-could I do more would, but God must com fort you. Yours, in our dear Lord Jesus, W. COWPER. In the following year the tender feelings of Cowper were called forth by family affliction, that pressed more immediately on himself; he was hurried to Cambridge by the dangerous illness of his brother, then residing as a Fellow in Bennet College. An affection truly fraternal had ever subsisted between the brothers, and the reader will recollect what the Poet has said in one of his letters concerning their social intercourse while he resided at Huntingdon. In the two first years of his residence at Olney, he had been repeatedly visited by Mr. John Cowper: and how cordially he returned his kindness and his attention the following letter will testify, which was probably written in the chamber of the invalid, whom the writer so fervently wished to restore. LETTER XIX. To Mrs. COWPER. March 5, 1770. My brother continues much as he was. His case is a very dangerous one; an imposthume of the liver, attended by an asthma and dropsy. The Physician has little hope of his recovery: I might say none at all, only being a friend, he does not formally give him over by ceasing to visit him, lest it should sink his spirits. For my own part I have no expectation of his recovery, except by a signal a interposition of Providence in answer to prayer. His case is clearly out of the reach of medicine, but I have seen many a sickness healed, where the danger has been equally threatening, by the only Physician of value. I doubt not he will have an interest in your prayers, as he has in the prayers of many. May the Lord incline his ear, and give an answer of peace. I know it is good to be afflicted. I trust that you have found it so, and that under the teaching of God's own Spirit we shall both be purified.—It is the desire of my soul to seek a better country, where God shall wipe away all tears from the eyes of his people, and where, looking back upon the ways by which he has led us, we shall be filled with everlasting wonder, love and praise. I must add no more. Yours ever, W. COWPER. The sickness and death of his learned, pious, and affectionate brother, made a very strong impression on the tender heart and mind of Cowper-an impression so strong that it induced him to write a narrative of the remarkable circumstances which occurred at the time. He sent a copy of this narrative to Mr. Newton. The paper is curious in every point of view, and so likely to awaken sentiments of piety in minds where it may be most desirable to have them awakened, that Mr. Newton has thought it his duty to print it. Here it is imcumbent on me to introduce a brief account of the interesting person whom the Poet regarded so tenderly. John Cowper was born in 1737 : being designed for the Church, he was privately educated by a Clergyman, and became eminent for the extent and variety of his erudition in the University of Cambridge. His conduct and sentiments, as a Minister of the Gospel, are copiously displayed by his brother, in recording the remarkable close of his life. Bennet College, of which he was a Fellow, was his usual residence, and it became the scene of his death, on the 20th of March, 1770. Fraternal affection has executed a perfectly just and graceful description of his character, both in prose and verse. I transcribe both, as highly honourable to these exemplary brethren, who may indeed be said to have dwelt together in unity. "He was a man," says the Poet in speaking of his deceased brother, "of a most candid and ingenuous spirit; his temper remarkably sweet, and in his behaviour to me he had always manifested an uncommon affection. His outward conduct, so far as it fell under my notice, or I could learn it by the report of others, was perfectly decent and unblameable. There was nothing vicious in any part of his practice; but being of a studious, thoughtful turn, he placed his chief delight in the acquisition of learning, and made such acquisitions in it, that he had but few rivals in that of a classical kind. He was critically skilled in the Latin, Greek, and Hebrew languages; was beginning to make him self master of the Syriac, and perfectly understood the French and Italian; the latter of which he could speak fluently. Learned, however, as he was, he was easy and cheerful in his conversation, and entirely free from the stiffness which is generally contracted by men devoted to such pursuits." I had a brother once: Peace to the memory of a man of worth! Was sacred, and was honour'd, lov'd, aud wept Another interesting tribute to his memory will be found in the following letter. DEAR JOE, LETTER XX. To JOSEPH HILL, Esq. ** * * May 8, 1770. * Your letter did not reach me till the last post, when I had not time to answer it. I left Cambridge immediately after my brother's death. I am obliged to you for the particular account you have sent me He to whom I have surrendered myself and all my concerns, has otherwise appointed, and let his will be done. He gives me much, which he withholds from others; and if he was pleased to withhold all that makes an outward difference between me and the poor mendicant in the street, it would still become me to say, his wif be done. It pleased God to cut short my brother's connections and expectations here, yet not without giving him lively and glorious views of a better happiness than any he could propose to himself in such a world as this. Notwithstanding his great learning (for he was one of the chief men in the University in that respect) he was candid and sincere in his inquiries after truth. Though he he could not come into my sentiments when I first acquainted him with them, nor in the conversation which I afterwards had with him upon the subject, could he be brought to acquiesce in them as scriptural and true, yet I had no sooner left St. Alban's than he began to study with the deepest attention those points in which we differed, and to furnish himself with the best writers upon them. His mind was kept open to conviction for five years, during all which time he laboured in this pursuit with unwaried diligence, as leisure and opportunity were afforded. Amongst his dying words were these, "Brother, I thought you wrong, yet wanted to believe as you did. I found myself not able to believe, yet always thought I should one day be brought to do so." From the study of these books he was brought upon his death-bed, to the study of himself, and there learnt to renounce his righteousness, and his own most amiable character, and to submit himself to the righteousness which is of God by faith. With these views he was desirous of death. Satisfied of his interest in the blessing purchased by the blood of Christ, he prayed for death with earnestness, felt the approaches of it with joy, and died in peace. Yours, my dear friend, W. COWPER, |